Speaking at AFA’s virtual Air, Space & Cyber Conference on Sept. 16, Vice Chief of Staff Gen. Stephen W. “Seve” Wilson said a large portion of Air Force employees may continue telework even after the COVID-19 pandemic subsides.

“They may show up to work in a work environment once a day, once a week type of thing,” said Wilson. “Because we’ve got everything connected, because we’ve got this workforce that can now work from wherever they are, whenever they want, it’s changed the paradigm on how we’re going to do work,” he said in an Air Force Magazine article.

Due to the compartmentalized nature of classified information, many Air Force employees will need to continue working from a physical office for security reasons.

Before the pandemic started Air Force officials said the service had only 20,000 remote computer connections for a 750,000-person workforce. With help from the Defense Information Systems Agency and using virtual private networks (VPN), the service was able to expand its telework capabilities.

“We can work from all over the globe. We have adopted best-in-class tools. Really, we are able to equip our Airmen to work wherever they are, which has been incredible,” said Lauren Knausenberger, the Air Force’s chief transformation officer.

Air Force photo by Tech. Sgt. Jim Araos